


Inside And Out She’s Better Than I Am

by A_Tomb_With_A_View



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Alex and Bobby are qpps, Aroace Carrie Wilson, Asexual Bobby Wilson, Bobby Wilson has anxiety, Carrick QPPs, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Polyamory, Ray is a good dad, Reggie has fibromyalgia (referenced), Snapshots, Trevor is Bobby and Carrie’s uncle, Trevor is a good dad, Tw: discussion of emotional abuse, Tw: discussion of emotional manipulation, Wow so much projection, aroace Nick, sibling relationships, this is just abt siblings okay kids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 19:07:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29476710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_Tomb_With_A_View/pseuds/A_Tomb_With_A_View
Summary: Bobby doesn’t ever remember a time before Carrie.He knows there was a couple of minutes, right at the very beginning, when he was just Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, and not Bobby, brother of CarrieFor the first ten years of his life, the first part doesn’t matter at allFor the first ten years of his life, the second part means the world.When they get a bit older, things get a bit trickier.
Relationships: Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Alex Mercer, Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Carrie Wilson, Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Nick (Julie and The Phantoms), Bobby | Trevor Wilson/Alex Mercer/Luke Patterson/Reggie Peters/Willie, Bobby | Trevor Wilson/Ray Molina/Rose, Flynn/Julie Molina, Nick & Carrie Wilson
Comments: 12
Kudos: 83
Collections: Julie and the Phantoms Bingo Challenge





	Inside And Out She’s Better Than I Am

**Author's Note:**

> Hi kids!  
> I’d love to say this was borne of something super profound but like. My little brother asked if I’d cover for him while he went to smoke a joint at 3am and I got emo about how our relationship is healing. So. Have some huge projection plus some extra spice because if this were based off my life in it’s entirety their mum would be a better person lol  
> Anywho, the usual disclaimer: 90% of the fucky parents stuff and the therapy and the fucky sibling stuff and the anxiety etc etc etc is based off my own experiences  
> This is also my entry for the Bobby square on my jatp bingo board :))  
> Enjoy!

Bobby doesn’t ever remember a time before Carrie.

He knows there was a couple of minutes, right at the very beginning, when he was just Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, and not Bobby, brother of Carrie. 

For the first ten years of his life, the first part doesn’t matter at all. Col and Laura aren’t the worst parents in the world, but they’re hardly going to be winning awards for it any time soon. Bobby never really knows how much they’re aware of it. He doesn’t know if Laura sees the way his smile dims when she asks Carrie if she wants to go shopping - again - and he doesn’t know if Col has heard him pottering around at six in the morning because dad was stressed about how much he had to do tomorrow and sure, he’s not big enough or old enough to tick off everything, but he’s big enough and old enough to do the dishes, and if dad isn’t stressed, dad won’t yell. There is nothing to his life that makes him particularly proud to be Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, even if guilt jolts through him when he acknowledges that the fun things they do when they go on holiday don’t make up for how much of that holiday he spent hiding from the harsh remarks about how ungrateful the other parent is. 

For the first ten years of his life, the second part means the world. There’s a lot to being a good big brother. Sometimes when he talks to Eddie from his district football team, he wonders if he’s doing the same amount as other big brothers. He helps Carrie with her homework, and he makes sure dad has someone to talk to about his issues and he makes sure he doesn’t need too much energy from anyone, because Carrie likes it when the focus is on her, and really, Bobby can get as much happiness from the books stacked next to his bed as he can one of his parents smiling down at him. They play top trumps on long drives and he makes sure to let her win, and even though sometimes he’s careless with his words -  _ hey, don’t be mean to Carrie, you can’t expect her to be able to read, she’s not that smart  _ \- he makes sure she knows he loves her. 

When they get a bit older, things get a bit trickier. 

The fighting gets a little worse. 

Carrie starts wanting less to do with him. 

Where before she would’ve fought someone to defend him, now she fights him just because he’s there. 

They get into different middle schools, and Bobby breathes a sigh of relief. 

He makes new friends, people who he doesn’t care all too much about, but who are nice enough, and he’s annoying, god he knows he’s annoying, but primary school was twenty two kids who had to choose between him and Carrie, so he was still finding his footing with how to talk to people who don’t spend their weekends reading about which plants could kill you and why. 

It’s the first time ever that Bobby has been neither Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, nor Bobby, brother of Carrie.

For the first year, he feels like he’s been thrown in the deep end, left to try and make enough of himself to float while Carrie and mom and dad do their best to wrap around his ankles and tug him back down with yells of  _ I don’t care about your homework I can’t do mine and I need help  _ and  _ c’mon Robbie it’s really not that much to expect you to cook, you’re the first to get home  _ and  _ Jesus Rob, do I look like I have enough time to help you out right now?  _

Seventh grade is… better. He’s still finding his footing with friendships, but he meets Alex Mercer, who’s in his homeroom, and for the first time, Bobby feels like… himself. 

It’s hard to explain to Carrie, who still sometimes seems to like him, but Alex makes him feel like he feels when he’s by himself, and he’s trying to hard not to be  _ too much _ , because Alex is having a hard time at home and Bobby doesn’t want to dump his shit on him, but everything that’s going on seems a little bit less important when Alex is teaching him to play the drums. 

In eighth grade everything gets simultaneously better and worse.

Carrie makes friends who teach her to roll a joint and invite her to parties, and she gets meaner and shorter and Bobby wants so bad to go back to when it was the pair of them against the world, but now it feels like Carrie and the world against Bobby, and she seems happy and he can’t bring himself to do anything to even the stakes. 

It’s not all her fault, he does admit.

He gets meaner, and he goes from being short and a little intimidating to the people who can’t see past his resting bitch face and squared shoulders to a boy-shaped shell containing a whirlwind of anger that seeks through the cracks people make in him. 

He’s cruel to Alex and to Carrie and to himself, especially, and when he tells mom and dad that he thinks he needs to see someone, dad tells him that it’s just a Wilson thing, and he should try working it out in the gym. 

He stops talking to Carrie when he doesn’t have to, and he stops cooking after school because really, at fourteen it’s not his job, and dad yells at him over it but that just makes him even more determined not to do it, and Alex makes friends called Reggie and Luke, and Bobby lets him go, because he doesn’t have the capacity to let new people in. People are sharp, and their edges chip away at his shell, and more anger leaks through every single time. He knows he can lose Alex peacefully, or he can let Reggie and Luke chisel at him until he loses Alex violently. He looks himself in the mirror and reminds himself that he loves Alex, and he promises himself he’s going to pull away. 

Alex doesn’t stop him, not really, but Bobby’s been snapping at him and picking fights for months now, so he reminds himself that if Alex tried to hold on, his hands would blister and burn, and Bobby has never wanted Alex to hurt, so he focuses the burn of his anger on himself, and he cries exactly once, the night after the first time Alex doesn’t wave him over to sit with them at lunch. 

He doesn’t cry again for years, not even when Alex and Reggie and Luke aren’t on the register for roll call on the first day of highschool. He knows from Instagram that they’re a band, so he assumes they’ve gone to Los Feliz. He would’ve applied there, but the application was expensive, and even Carrie had been told no.

When he’s fifteen and two days, dad walks out for the last time. Mom decides she can’t look after twins who refuse to be in the same room, and she calls in Uncle Trevor, who’s a famous rockstar with a place just outside of LA that he whisks them into.

Trevor is gentle and nice and Bobby hates himself a little more every time he says something needlessly scathing, but the lines in the sand are drawn, and Trevor can only love one of them.

Carrie needs it so much more than Bobby does. 

——

Trevor is dating a man called Ray Molina  _ and  _ a woman called Rose Molina, and Bobby doesn’t really understand how it works, but he knows that Ray looks at him with sad eyes and Rose tries to reach out to him, and it’s so confusing because they keep reaching for Carrie as well, and they don’t seem to understand that the rift between them isn’t one that can be straddled. 

The first conversation he has with Carrie in four months that doesn’t involve scorching insults and senseless violence is because of Rose Molina. 

“Rose wants us to apply for Los Feliz,” Carrie tells him, tone flat. “It’s a performing arts school. Their daughter, Julie, she goes there.” 

Bobby doesn’t look up from his phone. He doesn’t like looking at Carrie anymore. She looks too much like mom and too much like dad, and every time she speaks she can just hear dad’s voice in the back of his mind, saying  _ mom loves Carrie more, and I’m just so angry for you, kid, that she doesn’t have the decency to even try and pretend she doesn’t have a favourite.  _ The hundred dollar clip in her hair is just another reminder that even trying to be as little of an annoyance as possible hadn’t been enough for his mom. “You can apply,” he says. “It’s more your scene than mine.” 

Carrie sighs, like he’s being difficult. He’s always being difficult as far as she’s concerned, but he’s not entirely sure what he’s done wrong this time. “She said you’d say that, and she told me to tell you that we’re both applying. She’s heard you play, and for some reason she thinks you’re not totally talentless. And… Y’know. You’re not the worst. A school where they teach you that kind of thing would be good for you.”

Bobby finally looks up from his phone. He still doesn’t meet her eyes. They’re not the same as his, a little lighter, a little warmer, but somehow that small difference has always meant so much to him, which is weird, because they’re not even close to identical. “C’mon, Carrie. You know us going to the same school is a bad idea. You’re the musician. You go, I’m fine where I am.”

For some reason, she manages to glean from that what this is really about. “Julie is friends with Alex,” she says, her voice a million shades gentler than he’s ever heard it. “So you’re going to start seeing him again whether you end up at the same school or not. Don’t let that be a deciding factor.” 

He thinks about it. Considers staying where he is, at a school where he’s not Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, where he’s not Bobby, brother of Carrie, where things might change now that he’s Bobby, nephew of Trevor Wilson. Considers moving to Los Feliz, where he’ll be Bobby, ex-best friend of Alex Mercer, where he’ll be Bobby, brother of Carrie for the first time in years. Where Trevor Wilson will likely not be the most famous person sending their child. 

“Okay,” he decides after a minute. “Is. Is Rose our step mom now? Is that what's happening? I’m so confused about everything.” 

Carrie laughs and sits down next to him on the bed. Bobby kind of wants to hug her, but they haven’t hugged in years, and she slapped him four times for trying to borrow a backpack she hasn’t used in years three weeks ago, so he doesn’t chance it. “Kind of? Uncle Trev is just our legal guardian, though. More like our new aunt, I guess.” She pauses. “I like her. I always wished mom was more… well, more like Rose is, I guess. You’d like her, if you gave her the chance.”

Bobby blinks. He doesn’t really know what she’s trying to say. “I thought. Mom loved you?” 

Carrie shuffles until she’s laid down. “That didn’t make her a good mother. She loved you as well.”

“Well yeah, but, like, way less,” Bobby says slowly. “Dad always said so, didn’t you notice?” 

There’s an awkward pause, and when Bobby looks up, Carrie looks like she’s seen a ghost. “He always said  _ what?”  _

Bobby shakes his head frantically, laying down next to her so that she can see him properly. “Not in a bad way or anything, I mean, it was kind of obvious, and he was just annoyed on my behalf, but anyways, that’s besides the point, I-”

“It absolutely is not besides the point,” Carrie protests. “God, Bobbers, you need so much therapy. You should talk to Uncle Trevor, he’s seeing a therapist, and he’s already got me signed up.” She rolls away to stand up, and Bobby thinks about reaching out for her in the half second that she’s within his grasp, but she never was, not really, so he lets her go and thinks about when she was five, and used to beg him to play with her like he was the only friend in the world she wanted. 

God, five was such a good age. 

——

Los Feliz is smaller than he’s used to. 

Carrie makes friends immediately, and Julie, who he’s been getting closer to tentatively, has her group that Bobby refuses to acknowledge, and that doesn’t really leave very many people left.

He doesn’t mind. 

He sits next to a person called Willie in his English class, who’s smart and pretty and funny, and he spends so much time avoiding Alex-and-Luke-and-Reggie that he makes friends with the music teacher by accident, who always lets him hide out in one of the smaller practice rooms and lock the door, even though he’s technically not supposed to do that. 

He makes friends with one of the boys on the lacrosse team, as well - Nick Danforth Evans - who is always happy for Bobby drag him to the beach to surf whenever he wakes up to a voice that he recognises like it’s his own echo in the living room. 

He’s coping and he’s fine, and he starts cooking again. 

The therapist Trevor sets him up with helps coach him through asking Trevor and Rose and Ray if they’ll stay out of the kitchen when he’s cooking, and they tell him the anger which he can’t seem to reach for any more was likely the byproduct of growing up in a home where that was the only negative emotion he ever saw expressed. She tells him she thinks he’s got anxiety, but had never seen either of his parents cry or apologise or take a day to themselves, and that he’s only just learning how to be unhappy without being angry. 

He thinks about apologising to Alex a million times, but every way he thinks about it just sounds like an excuse, and Alex doesn’t need him anyway, so he just leaves it.

Carrie reminds him three times a week that Julie and the Phantoms are looking for a rhythm guitarist, and three times a week he reminds her that Julie tolerates him and Reggie and Luke glare at him every time they see him, and Alex never fought for him at all. His therapist tells him it’s reasonable to be bitter about that last point, and that as long as he remembers that he wanted for that to happen, then it’s okay to be a little bit upset about it. 

“For fuck’s same, Bobby,” Carrie yells. “I know you’ve got your head up your ass about being unlovable and unforgivable and untalented but they want a rhythm guitarist, and Ms Harrison says you’re the best Los Feliz has! Just suck up your goddamn pride, and ask!” 

Bobby tries to shush her frantically, knowing Julie and her band are in the living room. Trevor’s place is huge, but sound carries. 

Despite his best effort, there are four faces peeking in his door moments later.

Julie looks confused, and maybe a little hurt. “I didn’t know you played rhythm guitar? She asks. “How come you didn’t say anything when I asked?” 

Bobby doesn’t know why Alex, Luke and Reggie look just as confused as Julie. “What?” 

Luke crosses his arms over his chest. “Jules wants to know why you didn’t say anything,” he reiterates. “Y’know, because we’ve been asking about a rhythm guitarist for months and you literally live in the place we practice and hang out?” 

Bobby glances to Carrie, who looks smug. “I. Um. What?” His chest feels tight. “I’m sorry, I was just leaving. I have to go.” 

Carrie’s smile drops and she grabs his arm. “What the fuck are you doing?” 

He shakes her off, grabbing the duffel bag he always keeps by the door for when he needs to be literally anywhere else. “I’ve got plans.” 

“You never have plans. Who even with?” 

Julie and her boys just glance back and forth between them like they’re watching a particularly interesting tennis match. 

Bobby rakes a hand through his hair and tugs on the hoodie that he’s pretty sure Willie lent him when their English class went to go see Hamlet. He keeps meaning to give it back. 

Alex’s eyes drop to the logo, and his expression goes weird. Luke and Reggie look similarly conflicted. 

Bobby ignores it. “Nick. Lacrosse team. Very blond. He surfs, I surf. We have annoying siblings that we like to hide from.” 

Carrie doesn’t seem to have anything to say to that, and when he walks towards the door, Julie and the boys move out of his way. 

“So, are you gonna play with us?” Alex asks as he walks past.

It’s the first time Bobby has heard Alex say anything directed towards him in three years. He decides to invite Willie to come surfing as well. More voices will make it easier to forget about this little incident. “Um. Sure?” 

Alex doesn’t look satisfied, but then Reggie’s hand is curling around his neck and Luke’s arm is looping through his and Bobby is allowed to leave. 

Carrie calls him when he’s halfway to the beach. “What the fuck was that?” 

A text comes through from Willie saying he’s totally down to surf for a few hours, and Bobby breathes out shakily. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t know, are you in love with Alex or something? You didn’t need to be rude to Julie,” Carrie scolds.

Bobby considers that one for a moment. He’s never really thought about it. He knows his friendship with Alex was a concerning shade of independent, but he’s pretty sure it’s not love. “I’m not in love with Alex.” When he says it, he’s confident he’s not. He thinks romantic feelings are more like the weird fluttering his chest when Willie tucks their hair behind their ear. “I’ll make it up to Julie, I promise, Care.” 

Carrie pauses. “You haven’t called me that in ages.”

“You’ve been a little bitch for ages,” he reminds her. “No cornering me like that again, okay? It’s not. I don’t like surprises like that.” 

He doesn’t expect Carrie to agree as quickly as she does, and warmth blooms under his sternums. “Yeah, you’re right. I’m sorry.”

“No, no, it’s okay.” Bobby waves when he sees Nick jogging into the beach car park. “Are Alex, Reggie and Luke together?” 

“I thought you weren’t interested in Alex?” Carrie asks.

Bobby snorts. “I’m not, but I don’t wanna offend anyone by saying the wrong thing.”

“Says the guy who called Julie annoying this morning.”

“I was clearly talking about you, and I’ve already said I’ll make it up to her,” Bobby defends himself. “Anyway, I was just curious. I’ve gotta go.” 

“That’s your cute boy voice, you’re not with Nick are you?” Carrie sounds delighted. 

Bobby chokes on his spit. “It’s not Nick,” he says. He’s not used enough to benign interest from Carrie to know that she’ll pick up on the phrasing of that. 

“... who else are you hanging out with?” Carrie demands, and there’s a sound like someone shushing someone further away. 

Just as Bobby opens his mouth to answer, he sees Willie catching up to Nick, in just shorts and an open shirt, a bag slung over his shoulder and a board under his arm. The sound that comes out of his mouth instead of an answer could probably be described as a squeak, but he refuses to acknowledge it. “No one,” he gets out once he’s got his brain back in gear. “Um. No one. I’ve gotta go, Nick and Wil- um. Nick’s here. Bye.” 

——

“So, let me get this straight,” Carrie says slowly, perched on the kitchen counter. Their relationship is still… fragile, but he finds she’s the only person who’s presence in the kitchen while he cooks doesn’t make his heart race. “Alex is dating Willie and Luke and Reggie, who’re all dating each other.”

“Yup,” Bobby nods, sliding the spatula under the pancake to make sure it’s not sticking to the pan. “Oh, and I’m pretty sure Luke and Julie are dating? I don’t really know about that bit, though.”

“And you’re going on a date with Willie… but you’re not dating any of the others?”

Bobby shrugs, moving away from the hob so he’s got enough space to flip the pancake. “Luke and Reggie probably haven’t forgiven me for the whole Alex thing in eighth grade, and it’s not like that, it’s never been like that, with Alex himself. So.” 

Carrie coughs, and when Bobby looks over, she’s gone a worrying shade of pink, and there’s juice dripping down her chin. “That sounds like you’d be down to date Luke and Reggie if they didn’t hate you - Which, they don’t, by the way. No one holds grudges for three and a half years.”

“I’m sorry, when was the last time you spoke to Flynn?” Bobby asks, tossing the pancake in the air and catching it perfectly. “Was it in fourth grade? She’s literally our little sister’s best friend, Care, you have to speak to her eventually.” 

Before Carrie can say anything, Carlos is skidding into the kitchen at full speed. “Pancakes!” 

Bobby laughs and manages to put the pan down and scoop Carlos up before he can crash into the oven. “Hey there, little man. What’s a-happening?” 

Carlos wriggles until Bobby obligingly sits him down on the counter next to Carrie. “Mom and dad are going out for dinner, and pops said we have to unanimously agree on a takeout before he’ll order it.” 

Bobby whistles lowly and slides the first pancakes onto Carrie’s plate. “That’s a big word. What are you thinking?” 

Carlos sticks his tongue out. “Chinese, I think. I want the barbecue chicken wings that mom doesn’t like.” 

“I could go for Chinese,” Carrie agrees. “We could invite everyone over?” 

Bobby feels his cheeks go pink. Willie had asked him out on Friday - after a very very long conversation about how seriously everyone has thought about it and how lengthy the conversations about trialling polyamory as a teenager have to be - and he’s not seen him since. “Sure,” he says, trying to be as casual as possible. “I’ll text the band chat, see what everyone wants.”

He can feel Carrie’s eyes on him as he ladles more batter into the frying pan. “You can ask Willie as well, if you want?” 

Carlos, unfortunately, is just as smart as they always give him credit for. “Ooh, who’s Willie?” He asks, tone a perfect imitation of the voice Trevor had used when Bobby had told him about his date. “Your boyfriend?” 

Bobby feels his cheeks burn. “They’re not my boyfriend,” he tells Carlos. “And if you want any pancakes, you’ll leave it at that.”

Carrie doesn’t leave it at that. “Our Bobbly has a date with Willie on Tuesday,” she stage whispers. “Willie is already dating Alex and Luke and Reggie, like how mom and dad and pops are dating, so you might have seen them before.” 

Carlos scrunches his nose up. “Is Willie the one with the long hair that Alex is always playing with? Isn’t Luke dating Julie?” 

“Luke is not dating Julie,” Julie says from the doorway. “We tried it, last summer, but we click better as friends. We just kept songwriting through our dates, or complaining about how we didn’t have enough time for songwriting.” 

Carrie narrows her eyes, and Bobby moves away from the oven to flip the next pancake. “I sense something else happened?” 

Julie’s cheeks flush. “Flynn agreed to go on a date with me,” she admits. “Pops said we can use his box seat at the theatre to see In The Heights next Saturday.” 

Bobby whoops. “Way to go! Nice job, Jules.”

“Thanks, Bobman.” Julie grins at him. “So, what’s this I hear about your date with Willie?” 

Bobby groans and turns back to the oven. “I miss the days when I only had one sibling and said sibling hated me.”

“I can totally hate you again,” Carrie offered. “I just need to focus on how you’re an idiot allo, and bam.”

Bobby whirls around, almost dropped his pancake. “You take that back.”

Carrie waves a hand. “You know I mean alloromantic, calm your tits. Anyway, you don’t mean that, you love us very much, and you can’t say you don’t because you’re a softy and we won’t believe you.”

Julie clears her throat, sticking her bottom lip out in an exaggerated pout. It’s too cute for her to have learned it from anyone but Luke, and Bobby already knows that he’ll end up doing whatever she asks. “Do you really wish you didn’t live with us?” 

Carrie laughs, and Bobby puts his pan down quickly to wrap Julie up in a hug. He knows she’s just pulling his leg, really, but he remembers the years of wishing desperately for things with him and Carrie to go back to how they were as kids, and he’s determined that Carlos and Julie are never going to feel like he doesn’t love them as much as he does. Carrie, too, but things are different for them. They’re beginning to realise how much they were set against each other, how everything was about Bobby’s academics and Carrie’s music, ignoring how Bobby loved the guitar and how amazing Carrie is at English, but he knows they’ve got a long way to go before he’s scooping her into hugs like this. “‘Course not.” 

“Bob, your pancake,” Carlos reminds him, then holds his arms out once Bobby has tipped the pancake onto a plate. 

“Thanks, little man.” Bobby lifts Carlos up to hug him properly, reaching out to fist bump Carrie. 

She looks at his outstretched hand with undisguised disdain, but reaches out and bumps her knuckles against his anyway. 

——

Bobby doesn’t mean to pick a fight with Carrie, but he supposes it was kind of inevitable.

For two kids who tense up at slightly raised voices and flinch at sudden noises, they’re not gentle with each other.

Carrie throws things, and Bobby throws insults, and by the time Carrie has stormed out, Bobby has unearthed more issues than Dr Turner has ever been able to tease out of him. 

Ray is the one to come after him, when he decides the best place to be is the beach. He thinks about texting Nick, or Willie, thought about finding Julie, or calling Alex, who’s steadily working his way back into Bobby’s heart, or hell, even Luke and Reggie, who’re still awkward around him, still don’t seem to really trust him with Willie and Alex, but who wouldn’t care enough to make him talk. Reggie and his hot water bottle and wariness to touch would be helpful around now.

Instead, he sits under the pier, and ignores how close the water is getting. 

Ray sits next to him after less than five minutes. He doesn’t try to touch Bobby, which he appreciates. Instead he just raises an eyebrow. “Talk.” 

Bobby sighs and lays back. “Carrie thinks she had it worse than me, when we lived with our mom and dad.” 

Ray doesn’t say anything, just motions for Bobby to continue. He doesn’t try to fill the space like Trevor does, or direct the discussion like Rose does. He just lets Bobby talk and talk and talk until his wounds have enough space to breathe and bleed and heal. 

“Our dad was a dick, right? He was angry, and too loud, and him and mom were just immovable object meets unstoppable force, but him and Carrie… let’s just say they didn’t get along. Carrie always knows what she wants to do, what she wants from people. She’s not malleable,” Bobby explains haltingly. “I'm not - I wouldn’t say I’m malleable either, but I’m smarter about it. She picks every battle because she thinks if she chooses not to fight once, people will stop thinking she can fight at all. I think if I start fighting I’ll never stop. So that’s how it was with dad. Him and Carrie yelled at each other until kingdom come, and then he’d rant at me about her, and about mom, and about everything, and I just sat there, and I let him say it.” 

Ray offers his arm, and Bobby doesn’t move into it, but he nods shortly to let Ray know he might, in a bit. 

“And… I guess that drove something between us. Dad was always telling me about how mom loved Carrie more, and about how Carrie just needed to apply herself, and when me and Carrie fought, he always took my side. How can you be friends with the person who’s taking your mom from you, who doesn’t appreciate how hard you work because they can dance and sing and get everything? And how do you be friends with the person your dad  _ always  _ chooses?” Bobby shrugs as best he can, let’s his legs lay flat and welcomes the rush of the tide up to his calves. “But all she saw was the yelling. She doesn’t know about the nights I spent worrying about the finances, about how much I hated being alone with mom and dad, about how every time she came home with something new and sparkly from mom it was just another reminder about how much  _ more  _ she got.” 

He takes a minute to watch the sun kiss the horizon. It seems like a good time to be talking about this. Twilight is one of those times that doesn’t really exist, to him. Tomorrow, in the morning, he’ll regret having said all of this, but for now the sky is a shade of indigo that he’s never seen recreated except in Reggie’s eyes under the right light, and he’s wearing Willie’s hoodie that he never ended up giving back, and he keeps fiddling with Luke’s guitar pick that he borrowed after his broke, and Ray’s weight and warmth next to him is all Alex, familiar and friendly and keeping him tethered to the earth. 

He heaves in a breath, and reminds himself firmly of the weird expression that Reggie and Luke always have when he’s around. They’re not his to have. 

“Da-Trevor keeps a spreadsheet, y’know?” He asks, instead of dwelling for too long. “Of how much he spends on the four of us. He lets me look at it, when my head gets bad, so I always know he’s being even. But every time he buys something for one of the others and not me, all I can think about is my dad telling me that Carrie got a new bag today, and how he wishes mom wouldn’t be so obvious if she were gonna have a favourite, and how sorry he feels for me.” He ties the drawstrings of Willie’s hoodie in a knot and then unties it again. “And then Carrie insists that I don’t get to be angry about it, because at least I wasn’t being yelled at all the time, and it’s just -” he cuts himself off, tugs the neck of the hoodie over his mouth and inhales deeply, trying to surround himself with the smelt of salt and cologne and  _ Willie.  _ It only works partially, because Bobby is not the first person to steal this hoodie, and he can make out traces of Alex and what he imagines might be Luke and Reggie. 

Ray squeezes his shoulder. “It’s okay,” he says softly, voice almost lost to the wind. 

Bobby sits up and leans against his side. “She's the one person I should be able to talk to about this,” he forces out, blinking furiously as his eyes start to sting. “Who should get what I’m saying and what I mean, who should understand when I say I still love mom and dad but I feel so fucking guilty about it, who should be right there with me when I remember all the good stuff that happened as a kid and how massively overshadowed it is by everything bad, but she never wants to talk about it because it’s always about her and how bad it was for her and about how I can’t get what I didn’t go through, and she doesn’t get that it was just as bad for me, just different.” 

Ray still doesn’t really say much, just pulls him so he’s leant against his side. “I’m sorry, mijo. That sounds pretty awful.” 

Bobby shrugs, wiping his eyes roughly with the sleeve of the hoodie. “I just miss her, sometimes, even though she’s like, right there, and then we hang out with Jules and Carlos, and everything feels okay, and we hang out with our friends, and everything feels okay, and sometimes we even hang out one on one. Usually, it’s just awkward, and kinda tense. I’m honestly kind of surprised it’s taken this long to properly fight. But, I’ve known Julie and Carlos for, like, six months, and I love them so much, and I just want it to be with Carrie like it is with them, and I understand why it isn’t, god do I fucking understand why it isn’t, but sometimes I don’t feel like she misses me at all.” 

Ray kisses his hair lightly. “Have you tried talking to her about it?” 

Bobby shrugs, resting his head on Ray’s shoulder. “I don’t want to talk to her about it, if that makes sense? I want to… I don’t know, talk to her about ace things, and joke about how shit our mom and dad were, and how lucky we are that we ended up with you guys. And I wanna tell her about Willie, and the huge, stupid crush I’ve got on Luke and Reggie, and I want her to tell me about what’s going on with her and Nick. But instead we either just about manage our way through a conversation for twenty minutes or we fight, and I don’t want to have to explain everything and make her understand. I just…I don’t even know.” 

“Do you wanna keep talking about it?” Ray asks lightly. 

Bobby considers it for a moment. “Not really.”

“Do you wanna go back inside?” 

“Not really,” he repeats. 

Ray nods, and rubs Bobby’s back gently. “That’s okay. We can stay here.” 

——

Carrie knocks on his door at two in the morning. “Bobstard?” 

Bobby sits up, rubbing the imprint on his face from where he’d fallen asleep on his phone, texting Luke and Reggie and Willie and Alex. “Wha’?”

Carrie doesn’t knock again, like Julie would, instead she opens the door and crawls into Bobby’s bed. “Do you know what a queer-platonic relationship is?” 

Bobby hums and nods. “Like me ‘n’ Al, right?” 

“Wait. Shit.” Carrie blinks. “Didn’t know you were smart enough to come to that realisation.” 

Bobby shrugs. “He hugged me and I got heart palpitations but not Willie-and-Reggie-and-Luke heart palpitations, so I went to Nick since he wants to go to med school, and he told me it could be a squish, which is an queer thing not a medschool thing, so I told Alex, because I got drunk, and then we googled it a lot. And now-” he gestures wildly, hoping Carrie will get it. 

Carrie nods, and snuggles closer. Bobby remembers years ago, hiding in mom and dad’s bedroom, cuddled up together to ignore the yelling downstairs. He wraps his arms around her, and hopes he’s not holding so tight that he bursts the bubble. “I think I… I don’t know how to phrase it.” 

“What do you mean?” He asks, voice quiet. Not because it’s two am, because Trevor and Ray and Rose sleep usually in the master bedroom on the other side of the house, and Julie and Carlos sleep like the dead, but because this is tentative, this new trust in him, and he’s fucking terrified of breaking the spell. 

Carrie shrugs and tugs the blanket up to their chins. “Do I have a squish on someone? For them? Am I squishing? I don’t know how to phrase it. Just…  _ Nick.”  _

Bobby laughs, soft huffs that seem so close to too much. Carrie doesn’t say anything, but her expression doesn’t close off. He presses forward. “I know what you mean, Carebear. Are you gonna tell him?” 

Carrie smiles, and it’s warm and pleased and fills his chest with something hot and inflating and it hurts, to be so happy for her, but he’s been hurting for her since the minute he stopped being Bobby, son of Col and Laura Wilson, and became Bobby, brother of Carrie, and it’s a cross he’d bear a million times, just for her to keep smiling like that. “He told me.” 

Bobby whoops and rolls over to pull her into a proper hug, ignoring momentarily the rules he’s laid out for himself. “That’s awesome!” 

She giggles and hugs him back, and it’s been so long since he’s hugged her that he doesn’t really know what to do with himself. “We gotta do loads of research, obviously, but like… I don’t know. I’m happy.”

“I’m happy for you,” he promises, and let’s go. He doesn’t feel empty, or alone, even though they’re not touching, not like he usually does when she’s so close and he isn’t brave enough to reach out. Carrie is within reach, and if he hugged her, she’d be okay with it. What he has right now is enough. “And Nick is a great guy.” 

“So are Luke and Reggie,” she says which seems like a bit of a non-sequitur. He doesn’t stop her, though. “I know I’ve been… uncertain of them, because you thought they didn’t like you because of something that happened in eighth grade, but, they’re good for you. All four of them. You’re a lot happier, at least, you seem to be.” Her smile becomes a bit awkward. “I know… I know you haven’t been, for a long time. And I know it wasn’t always my fault, but I know sometimes it really was, and I’m glad you got all of the romantic-ness for the two of us, because you deserve to be loved by as many people as you can hold, and… I’m not always easy to hold. I know that. I’m too mean, and too rough, and I blame you for far too much, just because you always took care of me and you’re there to blame, and I love you so much and I’m.” She stops short, and rolls onto her back to stare at the ceiling. “One day, I’m gonna hug you so tight, for hours, and neither of us will get hurt, but until then, I’m glad you’ve got them.” 

He holds his hand up and offers his pinky, remembers doing the same when they were little every night she crawled into his bed when she couldn’t sleep.

Carrie’s right. 

Some days when he reaches out for her, he cuts his hands on her sharp edges, and sometimes when he tries to tell her things, she sets fire to the smouldering embers of his hurt instead of soothing them, and there’s been so many times he’s turned to find her and been met with empty space and crushing silences. 

He gets it now, though, a little. He understands the way she’s defensive because he sees how much of Emily’s anger Luke internalises, and he understands why she can’t talk to him in the way he understands why Reggie doesn’t talk to his siblings, and she lashes out just like Alex does after a long Sunday sermon, and she doesn’t need him, in the same way Willie needs one of the others, some days, and he  _ gets  _ it, even if he wishes things were different from sometimes. 

He offers his pinkie. “We’ve made it this far.” 

She looks up at him, and for once, the hurt he sees in her eyes reflects the hurt he sees in the mirror. “We’re not going to be them,” she says. It’s not an answer, not really, but something in his chest slides into place. Something in his ribs loosens, and the happiness that hurt before fits, now. 

Carrie wraps her finger around his. 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are much appreciated if you enjoyed! Lemme know what you think :))


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